Hillary 1st Quarter Fundraising revised and downgraded; dead-even with Obama in 1st quarter

[TeamJordan23]

Not really a big revision IMO.

Yes, the Fund-Raising Records Fell, Just Not as Far
By MIKE McINTIRE

For Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, it was a monumental achievement: Her campaign announced in April that she had raised $26 million in the first quarter of the year, more than any other presidential candidate.

The tally was especially important because it nudged her past Senator Barack Obama, whose campaign reported a surprisingly strong $25.7 million, and allowed her to claim victory in the “money primary” that is widely viewed as an early test of endurance in the Democratic race for the presidential nomination.

But like a certain home run record, Mrs. Clinton’s big numbers might require an asterisk.

Her campaign has since had to subtract hundreds of thousands of dollars from its first-quarter total because of a variety of problems, including donors whose credit cards were mistakenly charged twice, contributions exceeding the legal limit and checks that bounced. As a result, her total was reduced to $25.6 million — dead even with Mr. Obama, whose first-quarter take also shrank, albeit to a lesser degree.

And in one important measure, the amount collected from individuals, it now appears that Mr. Obama surpassed Mrs. Clinton. Mrs. Clinton’s overall total included $236,000 from political action committees, while Mr. Obama did not accept money from PACs.

In a sense, the first-quarter results are a footnote to a political marathon that has already broken campaign financing records, and Mrs. Clinton’s accounting revisions amounted to a small fraction of what she raised. What is more, second-quarter results released last month showed Mr. Obama convincingly outpaced Mrs. Clinton from April to June, confirming him as a fund-raising force.

All the presidential campaigns have had erroneous or invalid donations. Mrs. Clinton has reported the most this year, with $540,000. Mitt Romney had $514,000, which as a percentage of his total exceeded Mrs. Clinton’s, although it never endangered his status as fund-raising leader among the Republicans. Among the other leading candidates, Mr. Obama had $114,000; Rudolph W. Giuliani and John McCain, both Republicans, reported $242,000 and $105,000, respectively; and John Edwards, a Democrat, had $104,000.

While some questionable contributions are not unusual in big-money contests, a review of the first-quarter results reveals that in Mrs. Clinton’s case, they potentially had the effect of clinching her title as the all-around fund-raising leader. The Clinton campaign scoffed at any suggestion that it could have gamed the system to come out ahead (there is no evidence that it did), pointing out that there was no way to know much money was needed to surpass Mr. Obama in the closing days of the quarter.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/13/us/politics/13donate.html?ei=5090&en=29ca444b7cc5e577&ex=1344657600&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=print

[flpoljunkie]

1. Of $540,000 "erroneous" Hillary campaign donations, how many were twice charged credit cards?

It would be very interesting to have this information.

[DrFunkenstein]

2. I Can't Believe I Swiped Twice On My $270,000 Contribution

I'm so embarassed.